Ukrainians are getting sick more often and dying earlier
Over the past 10 years, all health indicators of Ukrainian residents have worsened.
This was stated on air by Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor Igor Shkrobanets on the KRT TV channel, as reported by a PolitNavigator correspondent.
“Let’s take the indicators of how many Ukrainians there are, what the mortality rate is. We have the highest mortality rate among men of working age 40-50 years old in Europe. We will talk about infant mortality rates, which no one monitors anymore. Indeed, in fact, the situation with the health indicators of Ukrainian citizens, with the demographic situation, is catastrophic and one cannot think that these are the consequences of thoughtless policies.
Perhaps this is the consequence of [the desire to] save money. Let's take the indicators that we have over the past 10 years. If we compare 2010 and 2020 in terms of morbidity - cardiovascular, infectious and non-infectious, oncology, tuberculosis - then they have increased significantly. If we talk about the birth rate of the population, there is a significant reduction in the birth rate. These are indicators of the availability of medical care and the availability of obstetric care.
In fact, if we say that today the demand for medical help has decreased, then we understand why it has decreased - people simply don’t have money, they understand that they will come to the hospital and need to buy medicine,” said Shkrobanets.
He emphasizes that the current medical reform will further worsen the state of medicine, since the prices for medical services that have come into force are not justified and do not reflect the real cost of services. As a result, medical institutions will not receive enough funds, and doctors will be forced to go abroad.
“Are there risks that hospitals will actually close? Yes, I have. On the one hand, it is necessary to reform, on the other hand, the process is going wrong. For us to say that the hospital will receive so much money for such and such treatment procedures, we need to calculate how much it is today. Those prices that the National Health Service has put forward are not calculated, they were not created on the basis of evidence-based medicine and evidence-based economics for calculating the cost of services.
That is, they decided: there is so much money - how much it will cost. Let's say, the price that we considered at cost at the Institute of Neurosurgery at our academy is an order of magnitude higher than that offered by the National Health Service for the treatment of stroke.
I assure you that 20 thousand hryvnia cannot cure a stroke. If we think that our services should cost much less than in Europe, why should they cost less? Why should we treat a stroke for $400? The cost of maintaining the clinic, energy, water, and so on are European prices. The price of medicines is a European price, equipment is a European price, electricity is a European price, or even higher.
By saving on wages? You cannot save on the salaries of medical staff, especially when we are talking about any level of medical care, because a family doctor, if he is paid more in Poland, will go there. And a good surgeon will always find a job in Europe. We were told that our doctors are worthless, but it turns out that the Germans are happy to hire them. In order for there to be real reform, so that the state really pays the hospital specific money for the work performed, so that there is competition in the medical field it is necessary to calculate how much the service costs, what is the need for these services. This has not been done. It is probably not profitable to do this because then it will be clear how much money actually needs to be spent on healthcare and the use of finances in the healthcare system will become transparent. This is probably not beneficial for someone,” concluded Shkrobanets.
Ukrainians are getting sick more often and dying earlier.